Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Alex's birth day

I can't believe Alex is 1 week old tomorrow on his actual due date :) I want to get his birth story written down and share his birth day slideshow before he goes off to college...so, here we go!

On Tuesday, May 10th I had my 39 week appointment with my doctor. He jokingly said "are you ready to have a baby today?" I said sure :) After checking to see if I was dilated, he said while smiling, "well, maybe next week looks better to have a  baby!" I was not dilated at all and nothing had changed from the previous week. So, we left there with our appointment for the following week and had plans to induce on Wednesday the 18th if he wasn't here by then.

After dinner (around 5:30 pm) I started having contractions. They were not super strong, but were about 5-10 minutes apart. I wasn't paying too much attention to the timing since I was just at the doctor that morning and knew I wasn't dilated at all. I finished watching The Biggest Loser :) breathing through contractions and occasionally getting up and walking around to help ease the pain. Around 9:45ish I decided to call our doctor just to make sure since the contractions were pretty steady and I had started bleeding a tad. He told me to head on over to the hospital just to be safe. Mike called his parents to come and stay with a sleeping Evan and put the bags in the car while I showered. We really thought it was just a false alarm and that we'd be back in an hour or so.

After getting to the hospital and walking up to labor and delivery, the nurse asked what I was there for, and I said, "I think I'm in labor." I don't think she believed me because I wasn't in pain and I had walked up instead of riding in a wheelchair. Around 10:30 I think we finally saw the nurse and she checked to see if my water had broke (and it had while I was at home!) Apparently I had a slow break and not the big gush like I heard would happen. She also checked to see if I was dilated (remember that morning I was a 0!). She (and I) was surprised when she said I was already a 5. She said the baby would be here soon. I called my parents to let them know and they left St. Louis around 11 pm and got there around 1 am. By 11:30 or 12 I had my epidural and had a dose of pitocin. I was definitely feeling better and still couldn't believe that this was the real thing and I had no idea when we left the house that we would have a baby that night/early morning.

Around 1:45 am I was dilated to a 6 and an hour later (around 2:45 am) I was a 10! It was quick just like Evan's birth. Around 3 am I started pushing and pushed through 4 contractions and at 3:19 am on Wednesday, May 11th Alex James arrived into this world (also arrived on his Uncle Dan's birthday).
He came into the world not crying, but soon let out some little tiny cries and squeaks. He weighed 8 lbs. 5.9 oz. and was 20.5 inches long and completes our family.


2 comments:

Amber said...

That sounds wonderful! Very similar to Drake's birth story so it brings back a lot of memories. Congratulations!!

Brooke said...

Mine was a slow leak too, so I just thought i kept peeing my pants :). Thanks for sharing your story...Brooke